“If we don’t tell strange stories, when something strange happens we won’t believe it.” – Shannon Hale
Arthur Thomas Lee came into the world near the end of 1979. He closed the decade out, he likes to say, like a tiny sprig of cilantro atop an already-well-seasoned chili. Washington-born and -raised, he currently resides in Idaho, surrounded by nature. But he frequents Utah too. He has a degree in English from BYU-Idaho. He is a published poet, author, and essayist. More than that, he is a full-time dad. He has, over the years, been lucky in writing and business but even luckier in love. With the benefit of hindsight, he says, we are all able to look back and recognize moments when our lives changed for the better. That was true for him in 2003 when his son Benjamin was born, then again in 2005 when Parker came along, a third time the moment Jacob entered his life in 2007, and yet again in 2011 when he held Andrew for the first time. He thought he could not get any luckier. Then he did. After a period of heartache and hardship (pathei mathos), he met Renee. She was not in his life, he says, and then, one day, suddenly, she was. That, too, became true for her three kids (Amber, Logan, and Ella). Arthur and Renee married in 2024, finding purpose in the paths preceding their union, and a set of hands to hold along the path that lies ahead. And that is really all that matters. Onward!
He is passionate about stories (the living and the telling and the hearing of them) which, Brian Doyle once wrote, “is a holy thing, powerful far beyond our ken” and that “without the sea of stories in which we swim we would wither and die.” Stories connect. Stories heal. Stories save. Amen.
